Luke
23 Feb, 2007
Top Five Fridays: Gaming Characters
PALGN Feature | Our staff pick their favourites.
It's hard to believe, but in the 90s gaming characters were a huge part of gaming. Of course Mario and Sonic are amongst the most memorable mascots but there was also Bubsy, Cool Spot, Alex Kidd, Gex, Croc, Bonk and more. Whilst it may seem like the idea of using a gaming character to promote a title is now defunct, gaming characters are just as popular now. Some recent examples include Lara Croft, Sly Cooper, Master Chief, Jak and Daxter, Ratchet and Clank and Crash Bandicoot.
We asked our staff what their five top gaming characters of all time were. After some bickering and verbal slinging matches we came up with our top five gaming characters of all time.
5: Sonic the Hedgehog
The popularity of Sonic the Hedgehog may have waned in recent years but in the 90s Sonic was one of the most recognisable mascots in gaming. Despite the fact that the hedgehog's recent games have been really poor there is no doubting that Sonic is still extremely popular. Artist Naoto Ōshima, designer Hirokazu Yasuhara and programmer Yuji Naka are credited to designing the fast hedgehog whose soul purpose at the time was to take on Mario. Back in the 90's there really were only two mascots who mattered in gaming - Mario and Sonic, and depending on your console of choice you'd stand behind your mascot's games as if they were your best friends. 15 years after Sonic's original debut, the blue hedgehog has appeared in comics, cartoons, books and games. Sonic's next appearance is in the promising Sonic and the Secret Rings.
4: Solid Snake
Solid Snake originally debuted in 1987 in the Metal Gear titles, which are created by Hideo Kojima. When Metal Gear Solid was released on the PSOne back in 1998 Solid Snake became a recognisable mascot almost instantly. Since the aforementioned title debuted, every new Metal Gear title has been highly anticipated by eager gamers. Despite Solid Snake's popularity he wasn't playable for a long time in Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty and players controlled Naked Snake in Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. Solid Snake only makes a cameo appearance in the Snake vs. Monkey minigame. Solid Snake will return once again for Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots but in this game he looks to be edging towards retirement. The Metal Gear Acid titles for the PSP both feature Snake, but are side stories set in a parallel universe, the games are also card based battling games. Whether we see Solid Snake in Guns of the Patriots this year is still unknown but he will be making an appearance in Super Smash Bros. Brawl, so gamers looking for a Solid Snake fix will at least get a chance to beat Samus in Super Smash Bros. Brawl. Why would you want to beat Samus? Well she pegged third spot, that's why.
3: Samus Aran:
The original Metroid game, which debuted in 1986, originally painted Samus Aran as a male cyborg. However, at the end of the game it was revealed that Samus was actually a female, a shock that we're only just getting over twenty years later. Samus may seem like a character that has appeared in a lot of titles but there was a large gap between her appearance in Super Metroid (1994) and Metroid Prime (2002). Since then Samus has appeared in a sequel to Metroid Prime and two DS games, Metroid Prime Pinball and Metroid Prime Hunters. In fact, a demo for Metroid Prime Hunters was included with the first batch of Nintendo DS consoles. Samus makes a return later this year in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption for the Wii. Corruption was originally expected to be available at the launch of the Wii but was delayed until March 2007. Unfortunately it appears that the game has undergone another delay, so the title should be out before the end of the year.
2: Link:
Link only just missed out on being our favourite mascot of all time and looking back at his history it's not hard to tell why. Link is another one of Nintendo's most popular franchises, although he doesn't appear in as many games as Mario. Link first appeared in 1986 in The Legend of Zelda. In the Zelda titles you'll generally need to journey through Hyrule to save Zelda from Ganon. Link's latest appearance was in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess which was one of the best launch titles for the Wii and is one of the last GameCube titles released. Unlike Mario, Link very rarely appears in titles other than The Legend of Zelda games. Link appears as a bonus character in the GameCube version of Soul Calibur II and is a playable character in the Super Smash Bros series. Link's next appearance will be in The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, which is set for release on the Nintendo DS in the last quarter of the year.
1: Mario
There really should be no surprises about our number one mascot here at PALGN. Mario is one of the most successful franchises of all time and unlike Sonic, whose games have degenerated in quality recently, the Mario titles are solid, enjoyable games. Mario's latest 2D platformer game New Super Mario Bros was well received critically and commercially and Super Mario 64 is still considered by many as one of the best games of all time. Mario's catchphrase of "It's a-me, Mario" is recognisable to just about every gamer worldwide. Surprisingly, Mario has only appeared in a few platformers in the past twenty five years but this hasn't stopped him appearing on over 100 games - in fact Mario can be found racing a kart, playing tennis, golf, basketball, soccer and snowboarding. Ironically Mario actually started off being known as Jumpman in the Donkey Kong arcade game but his name was changed in Donkey Kong Junior. Mario mania was so high during the 90's that there was plenty of Mario branded merchandise including pinball games, comic series, books, puzzles and stickers. In 1993 a Super Mario Bros film was released and Mario has also appeared in other television shows. Mario has also had the honour of appearing on every Nintendo platform since his debut.
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